Thread Lock

I’ve noticed that some Bicycle fasteners come with some type of thread lock already applied to them. Anyone know what type of compound this is and why they do it? Is it as effective as the stuff you get in a bottle? What would a good liquid equivalent be? Sorry for so many questions!

It's a threadlocking compound, done for ease of assembly.

Tony

I’ve found this, it’s all in the search term. We call it thread lock but on bikes it’s Threadlocker!

**LINK**

Seems like the blue stuff is appropriate for most jobs on a bike that require it.

Vic

If its the blue stuff "painted" onto the thread its a medium strength thread locking compound pretty much equivalent to Loctite 243 "nutlock". Odds are its actually closer the stick version Loctite 248 as thats bit more oil tolerant.

Loctites are colour coded purple = weak, blue = medium, red or green = strong

Potted, over simple, loctite guide :-

222 screwlock. Purple colour. Relatively weak so safe to use on smallish screws.

242, 248, 641 nutlock. blue colour. General purpose, strong but can be undone with hand tools.

262, 270 studlock. Green colour. Semi permanent fixings, very strong but can be removed with serious effort.

638, 641 bearing fit. Green colour. Permanent fixings, very strong, removal needs heat either to directly break the bond or expand the casing for bearing removal.

Clive

Edited By Clive Foster on 02/05/2020 16:31:24

If you do not have any thread lock and need to 'lock' a thread whilst waiting to get some nail varnish will do the trick but beward od swmbo

H

Thanks for that Clive, very helpful.

I guess the reason for doing it is so the parts do not come loose with vibration. My motorcycle has a lot of bolts with it on. Not all though. Maybe they just put it on the parts that would cause danger if they came loose.

Steve.

There is a grade of blue thread-locker that is bonded to the surface of screws [no, I don’t mean the plastic inserts]: This contains the active material ‘micro-encapsulated’ ... rather like those printed scratch’n’sniff sample cards.

... Is that what you have seen, Vic ?

MichaelG.